


Passing Out

by Phoenixflames12



Series: An Endless Night: Extended Scenes [3]
Category: Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Alternate Universe - World War II, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-30
Updated: 2018-03-30
Packaged: 2019-04-15 03:03:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14150526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phoenixflames12/pseuds/Phoenixflames12
Summary: August, 1927Newly commissioned Captain Jamie Fraser passes out of his commissioning parade at the RMA Sandhurst, watched by and watching those he loves





	Passing Out

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to read this series thus far. It can't seem to get out of my head, so here is another little instalment for your enjoyment!

August 1927

 

It’s a bright, warm day in August and the parade ground at the RMA Sandhurst is full.

 

Young men in dark khaki stand nervously to attention, chests pulled out, fiddling with belts, caps and swords, swiping off dust, eyes flickering to their neighbours, sizing them up before darting back to the front.

 

‘Right, ye lazy baggards! Eyes front!’ A bark from the academy sergeant major shudders through them, sending the butterflies that are already making them so nauseous that no breath seems to be being uttered throughout the entire company into urgent, eager flight.

 

Their bodies hear the screams before their ears, rapidly clicking their heels to attention.

 

Not long now.

 

The last two years, two gruelling, punishing years that have pushed these new cadets to the very limits of physical and mental endurance can now be counted down to mere minutes.

 

Colour sergeants prowl up and down the rows of men, taking a final inspection. They are like mother tigers licking dirt off their cubs. Shadowed eyes under the peaks of their officer’s cap flick up and down and back again, darting out to pull a tie straight, push a cap back.

 

One of them stops before a tall, russet haired cadet, peering up into the impassive, chiselled face; bright, clear cat eyes trained straight ahead.

 

Only the slight tremble of the third and fourth fingers of the cadet's right hand, maimed in a motorbike accident last year, if he remembers correctly give away any sense of trepidation.

 

‘All there Mr fuckin’ Fraser? Who’d ha’ thought it? D’ye think yer father would be proud?’

 

‘Aye, sir.’

 

The words are barely a breath, hushed in the quiet, only a quiver of emotion tugging at the end.

 

He claps the cadet on the shoulder and moves on, smiling to himself.

 

That Fraser lad will go far, he is sure of it, even if his accent was utterly incomprehensible at times. The death of the boy’s father, had been a bitter blow, resulting in a period of compassionate leave and moments of almost inpenetrable brooding in the barracks room.

 

Thirty seconds left.

 

The academy sergeant major barks again, but what he says hardly matters.

 

The cadet with the bright, clear cat eyes knows it all already, has the poetry and lyricism of the Gaelic language of his homeland ingrained somewhere in his heart that is deeper than bone.

 

‘ _Cuidich ‘n Righ’,_ he whispers to himself, a small smile catching at the corners of his lips. _Aid the King,_ it meant, which is what the sergeant major is barking about now.

 

Deep in the pockets of his battledress tunic, he feels the warm, comforting weight of a wooden snake butt against his leg and smiles.

 

To the naked eye, the snake is nothing more than a toy, a talisman at most, roughly carved out of dark, fine-grained beech wood.

 

But to him, it’s everything.

 

It is the memory of his brother Willie, dead at eleven from the smallpox, just days shy of his twelfth birthday. Willie, who had held his hand fiercely on the train that painful first day of term at Ardvreck Prep, slipping the small, beech wood snake between his fingers and closing them firmly, casting a furtive glance round the carriage.

 

_‘For me?’ His voice had been a tremulous quiver, choked with after sobs, gazing through shining eyes up at his brother._

_‘Aye. Dinna look now,’ Willie had pulled him close, chin resting atop the mess of auburn curls, his next words a muffled whisper. ‘I carved it special, just for ye.’_

_Carved it special._

_Something warm had flared up in his heart at that and he had nuzzled closer, warm and safe in his brother’s arms._

_When at last he’d found the time to take a proper look at the snake, turning it over and over between heavy, sleep filled fingers under his covers in a dormitory that was thick with the breath of ten sleeping eight-year-old boys, he’d seen to his wonder that his brother had roughly carved the name Sawney on the bottom._

_His family name._

_Alexander, it meant, in the Gaelic. It was what his mother and father and Jenny and Willie called him in moments of tenderness back home at Lallybroch._

_Months later, curled up back in his home bed, shaking and exhausted by sobs, he had wondered if anyone would call him that again._

Standing in the soft August sunlight, he hears the voices of his dead pass by on the wind; a shroud of sadness creeping its’ cold fingers over him.

 

Keeping his head up, his eyes scan the crowd, searching for them.

 

Jenny had promised in her last letter to him that she’d make it down with Ian and would be thrilled to see his wife again.

 

He can just make out her in the crowd; a tiny, sparrow-like creature with her crown of dark Fraser hair piled high under the largest hat that he’s ever seen. She’s beaming at him, identical blue cat eyes glowing with pride, her arm firmly tucked in Ian’s.

 

_Ye’ve done brawly, my bonnie lad. Mam and Da would be proud._

Beside them, stands his godfather, Murtagh, coaxed down on a rare trip south, looking as out of place as a stuffed bear in a china shop in his kilt, stockinged feet and jacket. His dark moustache is bristling with pride, a face splitting grin lighting his eyes. Catching his eye, his brother-in-law gives him a mock salute, mischief twinkling in his hazel gaze and he has to bite back a smile.

 

_A Dhia, how he’s missed Ian! Missed them all!_

 

His eyes wander further still, before they find who he’s truly looking for.

 

She’s standing a little apart from the crowd, dressed in the soft grey summer uniform of the Military Hospital, her hair pinned up. He can just make out a strand coming loose, his hands itching to card their way through the silken spun thread and whisper out his love for her. Her stomach holds a slight swell to it and his heart lifts in his chest, a long breath that he hadn’t realised that he’d been holding sweeping through his lungs.

_‘Are you sure that you want me to come?’ Her question had been a tentative whisper in the quiet moments before she had been called back to the hospital before the Last Post, standing on tiptoe to meet him in the doorway to the barracks. The night had been soft and cool, playing lightly across the shadows of her face._

_‘Aye, Sassenach,’ he’d whispered back, fully aware that every man in the mess room could hear him and yet passed the point of caring, as he reaches up to cup her chin, drawing her lips to his, smiling behind the kiss._

_‘I wouldna want ye to miss it for the world.’_

 

Somewhere in the ground, the band strikes up and they begin the slow march past. The firm, downward beats of the Radetzky March floods the silence, the arm of his companion swinging past his own in perfect unity. In less than five minutes, he’ll be a fully-fledged officer of the 51st Highlander Division, ready to join the 4th Seaforth Highlanders in Inverness. In less than five minutes, the fragility of his friends’ flesh beside him will be considered qualified enough to lead men into battle.

 

Lead and fight and die for the good of king and country.

 

The thought doesn’t seem real.

 

What does seem real is the weight of his rifle butt pressing painfully into his palm, the sweat trickling down the back of his neck as he glances back to Claire, almost to make sure that she’s still there. She sends him a tremulous smile, cradling her swollen stomach, whisky coloured eyes that he loves so well glowing under her cap in the summer light.

 

 _‘You’re doing brilliantly,’_ those eyes seem to say. ‘ _Keep going. Me and the little one will still be here when you get back.’_

 

They wheel as one across the parade ground in an unbroken line, faces turned towards the dias. The fleet of doddering generals who had inspected the lines watch on, their creased and smiling faces prickling with jealously at the youth and vigour of the cohort before them, memories of their own commissioning parade flashing behind the rheumy eyes.

 

_No turning back now._

Squaring his shoulders, Captain Jamie Fraser braces the butt of the rifle against his arm and marches on.  

 

* * *

_**Fin** _

**Author's Note:**

> Please feel free to read and review! Comments, questions, constructive criticisms etc are like chocolate to my brain! 
> 
> Much love and enjoy x


End file.
